The GTDRI Stories: More About That Route

 A section of the infamous Impala Road

"The GTDRI Stories" is a series telling the history, untold tales, and showing the sights from the run of Guitar Ted Death Ride Invitationals. This series will run on Sundays. Thanks for reading!

The recon for the 2010 version of the Guitar Ted Death Ride was going to be so easy- that's because it was going to be exactly like the 2009 version! This meant that I had no late nights thinking about a route, or drawing up cue sheets either. It was, essentially, a vacation from that part of being an event director for me. That was great, because I needed a break anyway. 

And doing the same route was no problem for me. Some of you that know about or that experienced Trans Iowa may find that to be against my character, because I always made a new route every year for that event. But it isn't that simple. To me those were two completely different events and the fact of the matter was that the Trans Iowa events had to be on a different course every year or the event would fundamentally be broken. It wouldn't work as a concept if the route was the same for two years or more. 

That wasn't the case for the GTDRI because it did not rely on an unknown route and self-navigation as part of its challenge. To run the same route, for me anyway, was not only obviously an easier choice, but a compliment to my route finding. No one had ever raved so much about a route that it caused riders that weren't there to request that I "do it again". That was gratifying and made me feel pretty good.

My daughter drew and colored this in school. It became the header for 2010

The route was spectacular. I did all of the route finding myself, either for T.I.v4 or for this GTDRI specifically. But there were parts of this route which were traditionally a part of the "Colesburg 40", a gravel event held out of  Colesburg, Iowa. 

That event was originated as a Labor Day event to allow riders to prepare for the Chequamegon 40, a hilly 40 mile "mountain bike' event held in Wisconsin in mid-September. The Colesburg event was as hilly as Chequamegon and to add to the MTB flavor of the event, Colesburg traditionally used a dirt road named "Impala Road" in the Northwestern part of their route. 

Impala Road was truly a MTB road for its first quarter of a mile of the dirt section as you entered it from the North, and it was really steep. I can see the appeal to anyone trying to tune-up for Chequamegon. But at the time I was doing the route for the GTDRI, I was completely unaware that this was a part of the Colesburg route until Lance Andre, a former director of the Colesburg event, alerted me to that similarity between the courses. 

The route also was heavy on climbing, despite the 25 miles or so of fairly flat Turkey River hugging that the course had in it. The GPS stats from several riders indicated later that this route had just shy of 10.000 feet of ascent in its nearly 118 miles. Percent grades of plus-ten percent were commonplace and many riders were telling me they were seeing 12%-13% grades many times throughout the day. The infamous, nearly three mile long, Fantail Road climb maxed out at 18%! 

That climb had a "legend" attached to it that told of a local well drilling concern that had its rigs located somewhere on Fantail Road. The pitch of the road was so steep that the story went that a Caterpillar D-9 had to be used to pull the trailer with the drilling machine on it up the hill because a typical semi-tractor was not capable of doing it.  

Of course, it didn't hurt that the route was probably one of the most scenic I've ever put together.

Then the scenery on this route was spectacular as well. There were rarely any "boring bits" and you could spend all day taking images on this route if that was your aim. Of course, you may not complete the route in a day if you stop a lot to take pictures! 

Of all the routes I've ever put together, this is the one that holds up best. Front to back- it is a special route. I used to wonder aloud why there was never a gravel race in this part of the state, Colesburg being excepted, and for years this territory went devoid of any attention by gravel cyclists. Only recently has there been an event started up that way and I am sure it uses some of the same roads I used for this gravel route made for the GTDRI back in 2007-2008. 

This is a very special route, as I have said, and it remains as one of about three GTDRI routes I would do again. You'll not only be seeing this for the next GTDRI event I cover, but this one crops up again two more times after that. Stay tuned....

Special Notice: The GTDRI Stories will not appear next Sunday as that is Christmas Day. Look for the next GTDRI Stories to appear on New Year's Day, January 2023!